Aerospace and Defense

Company Overview of Spaceflight Industries, Inc.

Company Overview

Spaceflight Industries, Inc. manufactures and offers space products and services. It builds, launches, and operates satellites; and offers ground station networks that provide connectivity for small satellite missions or constellations. It offers Spaceflight Systems, a small responsive integrator developing systems for the commercial space industry; a secondary payload system; and spacecraft and launch systems, including microsatellites, such as the small agile tactical spacecraft for the U.S. Army SMDC, and the reusable booster system pathfinder vehicle for the USAF. The company also provides high performance CubeSat and NanoSat bus systems for a range of missions; a visible imaging microsa...

Spaceflight Industries, Inc. manufactures and offers space products and services. It builds, launches, and operates satellites; and offers ground station networks that provide connectivity for small satellite missions or constellations. It offers Spaceflight Systems, a small responsive integrator developing systems for the commercial space industry; a secondary payload system; and spacecraft and launch systems, including microsatellites, such as the small agile tactical spacecraft for the U.S. Army SMDC, and the reusable booster system pathfinder vehicle for the USAF. The company also provides high performance CubeSat and NanoSat bus systems for a range of missions; a visible imaging microsatellite; and SHERPA, which accommodates various small satellites. In addition, it offers sub-systems, such as avionics, torque rods, star trackers, solar panels and batteries, and dispensers. The company was founded in 1999 and is based in Seattle, Washington.

Spaceflight Industries, Inc. Key Developments

Spaceflight Wins First NASA Contract for Launch of U-Class Payloads

Oct 2 17

Spaceflight announced it was awarded its first NASA Kennedy Space Center Contract (KSC) for launch and integration services. The multi-year contract covers launch services in 2018 for a maximum of 24 payloads, with options to provide launch services for up to 24 additional payloads in 2019 and 2020. The potential total contract value is more than $5 million. U-Class payloads are miniature space research satellites that typically utilize commercial, off-the-shelf electronic components. The U-Class payloads flown by NASA, often created by universities and nonprofit organizations, play a foundational role in the agency’s technology development and include investigations in planetary exploration, Earth observation, and fundamental Earth and space science. Spaceflight provides the most launch options for customers, working with nearly every global launch vehicle provider, including the Falcon 9, PSLV, Dnepr, Antares, Cygnus, Electron, Soyuz and others, to ensure organizations can access space when they want. The “rideshare service” model provides more options for organizations to reach a desired orbit at a much lower cost than buying their own launch vehicle.

Spaceflight Industries has entered an agreement with Space Alliance, established by Thales Alenia Space and Telespazio, to accelerate the development of its Blacksky satellite constellation. The BlackSky constellation is expected to feature 60 small high-resolution observation satellites that are expected to provide frequent revisit rates over 95% of the Earth's population. As part of the deal, Space Alliance will make a minority investment in Spaceflight Industries.An industrial joint venture between Thales Alenia Space and Spaceflight Industries in the US is also expected to be formed as part of the deal. The proposed JV will be specialised in the production of small satellites. The new deal will also see the implementation of a joint cooperation and marketing agreement between Telespazio and BlackSky to improve their respective product and analytics portfolios.

The Space Alliance, formed by Thales Alenia Space (Thales 67%, Leonardo 33%) and Telespazio (Leonardo 67%, Thales 33%), signed a partnership with Spaceflight Industries which includes the following elements: A minority investment in Spaceflight Industries, which through its BlackSky business, has developed a geospatial platform and plans to build and operate a constellation of 60 small high-resolution observation satellites featuring very short revisit times; The creation of an industrial Joint Venture in the United States between Thales Alenia Space and Spaceflight Industries specialized in the production of small satellites; The implementation of a Joint Cooperation and Marketing Agreement between Telespazio and BlackSky enhancing their respective product and analytics portfolios on the market. The Earth observation market is undergoing constant changes, with an increasing focus on requirements that combine high resolution and much shorter revisit times. Thales Alenia Space, Spaceflight Industries and Telespazio are combining their strengths to offer a constellation of small satellites that will be deployed in conjunction with a smart ground segment to offer services at very competitive prices by calling on massive and automated data/image processing. The result is a disruptive product, designed not only for traditional customers in the commercial observation market, but also to support the development of new vertical B2B markets, such as mining, energy, transport, finance, agriculture, industry and environment, and even B2C. The agreement will be finalized pending all required regulatory authorizations.

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